It wasn’t perfect. It was gritty. But it could be a primer on disability rights in modern America.
1. Mutants are disabled (or metaphors for disabled people). Sure, everyone likes to focus on the positive aspects of their differences, but look at the negatives. Neurodivergence combined with disabilities of aging (dementia) and have additional challenges for aging Charles (seizures). Logan’s super-healing might keep him alive through ridiculous circumstances, but he lives with chronic pain, but physical and psychological. As the film so poignantly reminds us, killing, whether you’re killing good guys or bad guys, leaves a mark. And of course, there’s Caliban, whose skin burns in direct sunlight. These three mutants are living together and taking care of one another as best they can on the outskirts of El Paso (on the other side of the border, in Mexico, because the USA’s eugenics history has caught up to the mutants and effectively wiped them out). Charles even says he ran a “special needs” school...which of course is using an ableist euphemism, but also given the conversation he was having in that moment, it is the most fitting language (I am a huge proponent of using the language that you need to in order to reach the specific individuals you are talking to--meaning sometimes it’s necessary to meet someone where they are before going on to explain why where they are is actually problematic).
2. The history of eugenics in the United States of America is a long one that led to the forced sterilization of many people who were considered unfit to breed. A lot of these sterilizations took place in the institutions so celebrated by early 20th century progressives, and continued on into recent memory. Deaf and disabled people were among those who were most targeted for the forced sterilization programs. In Logan, there are references to a similar program (no mutants are born anymore).
3. There is a slight engagement with the conflicts between transhumanists and disabled people. These conflicts (which are not necessarily representative of two distinct sides, but rather are multi-layered and complex) generally revolve around the desire that transhumanists have in “transcending” human bodily limitations (such as by creating technological advances that allow humans to do things with super-human strength) and the desire that disabled people have to gain access to equipment that allows us to be out in the community, working or participating in recreational activities. I highly recommend the documentary film Fixed: The Science/Fiction of Human Enhancement by Regan Brashear if you are interested in exploring these questions. In Logan, the mutants face off not only against a chief of security who has a prosthetic arm and hand that he refers to as an enhancement, but also against an android of some sort or another that is based off the features of mutants, while seemingly without a soul. The creation of this android causes its human creators to seek to exterminate the natural born mutants they had been training. The conflict between transhumanists and disabled people in which transhumanists effectively appropriate our tools for very different uses is a central theme in the film Fixed. It is nice, as a disabled person, to see a film in which people using my community’s tools and bodies without any respect for where those tools and bodies originate are clearly portrayed as the bad guys.
4. With proper support, everyone is valuable. Charles is living with seizures and dementia, both of which due to living into his 90′s (part of the natural course of aging for many). He requires ample support, but with that support, he is still a human being with agency. His agency not only lies in his advice-giving (which in his case is an aspect of his personality, and has been since he was young, rather than a stereotype of old age) and the constant love he provides to those around him (even if sometimes it’s tough love). His agency also lies in some use of his powers. He calms some escaped horses before they get hit by trucks, and tells them to go back to their panicked masters. He tries to freeze the bad guys when they come to steal a young girl from him, and while this doesn’t go exactly how it would have when he was younger because he also has a seizure, if he had simply given up, the girl would have been captured, and he may have been killed. There is also that moment when he explains that experiencing a calm, safe family life for a night was a perfect experience. It is what many disabled people want--but due to the circumstances society tends to put us in, it is not something that we all have access to, and certainly we have less access to it than non-disabled peers.
5. The film is literally about trying to escape a society that wants to kill mutants. Hate crimes against disabled people have experienced a recent increase (I’m sorry I’m not citing my sources, btw, I have a migraine and can barely read right now so I’m writing from memory, so if any readers want to add notes with sources they know, please feel free, or send me a message, etc). Peter Singer, a man who advocates for wiping out genetic disabilities is as popular as ever, and tends to gaslight disabled people who speak out against him. The political situation in this country (USA) is one that is constantly trying to take the needed medical and other supports away from disabled people. We need support to be in our communities. Some of us need supports that can only come from programs like Medicaid. The situation in Logan--in which it is essentially illegal for the mutants to be themselves--is one that the US is very close to becoming. It could easily become that place by 2029. We could easily be in a situation where we disabled adults are living off the grid and trying to sneak disabled kids out of the country. The one thing the film missed, though, is that (at least for now) Canada doesn’t take disabled immigrants...
This was a fantastic movie. There were some problems, of course, as there always are, but some other highlights included the generic farm family trying to protect their way of life (classic American stereotype--if you are from a rural area like I am, you know that when you see that stereotype you immediately like those characters and feel connected to them, even when Hollywood filmmakers get some of the specifics--such as whether boys typically participate in barrel racing and pole bending--wrong). But, likely with full knowledge of this stereotype’s power over the American imaginary, and in response to the surge in vocal/visible racism this country is experiencing, in Logan that family happens to be African American. That kind of subtle social messaging, used in such a positive way, is really great to see in films. And, of course, the entire premise of the film--that it hurts you to kill other people, no matter why you are killing them--is important to our time, and perhaps all of time.
Edit: here is some relevant backup regarding forced sterilization. http://www.npr.org/templates/transcript/transcript.php?storyId=521360544